halloween

LakeCities Ballet in Lewisville to stage ‘Dracula’ for 10th year

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By ADAM SCHRADER
Published in The Dallas Morning News on Sept. 28, 2015

LakeCities Ballet Theatre will present its 10th fall performance of Le Ballet de Dracula at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 16 and at 2 and 7:30 p.m. Oct. 17 at the Medical Center of Lewisville Grand Theater, 100 N. Charles St.

Children can come dressed in Halloween costumes and wear stage makeup to dance with Dracula’s brides during a pre-performance junior bride workshop at 12:30 p.m. Oct. 11. The workshop, for children ages 8 and older, is free with the purchase of a performance ticket and an RSVP to guild@lakecitiesballet.org.

A haunted house will provide spooky entertainment before each performance and during intermissions. Admission is $3; however, bride workshop participants can enter free with a performance ticket.

Tickets are $17 for general admission and can be purchased at the door, by calling 972-317-7987 or by visiting lakecitiesballet.org.

Where’s best trick-or-treat neighborhood? Frisco makes social network’s list

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By ADAM SCHRADER
Published in The Dallas Morning News on Oct. 7, 2015

On Halloween night, kids across North Texas will hope to score the best treats in the area. But, it can be pretty disheartening to walk through a neighborhood with nobody home or no candy to take.

So, it shouldn’t surprise any area parent that Frisco, with a relatively low median age of 36.1 years and a relatively high median household income of $128,912, should be the top place in the area to knock on doors.

According to Nextdoor.com, a private social network for neighborhoods, Frisco is No. 5. The city was listed on Nextdoor’s list of the Top Ten U.S. Cities for Treats.

“Frisco is one of the fastest-growing cities in the country and more than third of our residents are students,” said Dana Baird, city spokesperson. “As a family-oriented community, activities like trick-or-treating and fall festivals are popular activities throughout Frisco neighborhoods.

“It’s a treat to make the Nextdoor list of sweet cities.”

To create the list, Nextdoor’s data team analyzed data from the tens of thousands of neighborhoods that use the annual Treat Map feature where users to let each other know they will be passing out candy by marking their home on their home with a candy corn icon on the map.

“We wanted to make it easy for neighbors to see who is giving out candy in their neighborhood and where,” said Anne Dreshfield, a Nextdoor communications associate. “You can even post if you’re hosting a haunted house with a haunted house icon.”

Last year, Frisco neighbors marked about a dozen haunted houses on the Treat Map.

The rankings were then based on the ratio of the number of Nextdoor members who indicated they were passing out candy last year to the total number of Nextdoor members in the city at that time in U.S. cities where more than 5,000 residents are signed up for the service. The list includes the city with the highest ratio from each state, up to 10 states.

This normalizes the neighborhood size to let smaller cities compete with larger cities, Dreshfield said.

The top-10 cities, in order, are:

Cary, N.C.
Ann Arbor, Mich.
Omaha, Neb.
Columbus, Ohio
Frisco
Orlando, Fla.
Downers Grove, Ill.
Greenville, S.C.
Baton Rouge, La.
Boise, Idaho

Thousands of Dallas-area neighborhoods, 150 of which are in Frisco, use the app to talk about community issues.

“Passing out Halloween candy is one of the most neighborly things you can do,” said Nirav Tolia, co-founder and CEO of Nextdoor. “We encourage neighbors everywhere to show their Halloween spirit by adding their own homes to their neighborhood’s Treat Map.”

Can’t make it out to Frisco? Find the best streets for treats in your neighborhood.

Review: Musical Theater of Denton’s ‘The Addams Family’ — a show to die for

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By ADAM SCHRADER
Published in The Dallas Morning News on Oct. 30, 2015

It was a dark and stormy night – the perfect setting for the Musical Theater of Denton’s performance of The Addams Family.

(Ironically, I almost died twice in the torrential monsoon on the way up from Dallas to see the show.)

I walked in to the Campus Theater off the square through a side door to witness the lobby, decorated spooktacularly as the inside of the Addams home.

But it wasn’t a somber event. The laughs of the lively audience started before the show even began.

“Remember: if you have small children with you, make sure to eat them,” the announcer said as the houselights dimmed.

The Addams Family musical seems to pick up years after the movies left off — filling the void we’ve all craved since the unfortunate Addams Family Reunion.

Morticia and Gomez want to continue living the way they always have. But Wednesday has fallen in love with a “normal” boy from Ohio, Lucas Beineke.  The Addams invite the Beinekes to their home for dinner. Secrets are kept and strain is put onto the family that relishes in pain and suffering.

It’s said the musical follows the characterizations of the animated TV show. But, the makeup, costumes and set design were stylized perfectly after the 1991 movie. In fact, the entire production mirrored the early ’90s films.

Alexis Romero, who portrayed Gomez, delivered each punch line of his dad-like one-liners and each song of his devotion to his wife Morticia, played by Anjelica Houston’s younger doppelganger Liz J Millea, in the style of Raul Julia down to the accent. Millea also gesturized like her predecessor in the role.

Paul Iwanicki played Uncle Fester with the mischievousness of Christopher Loyd, and taught us to love how only Fester can. Kristen Brasher played Grandma Addams, “who may or may not be in the family”. Her hilarious portrayal left me crying from laughter by intermission.

Jason Joos, who played Mal Beineke, made for a potent antagonist — but could have annunciated more as he was often unintelligible. Kristi Smith Johnson, who played Alice Beineke, Lucas’ mother, was surprisingly funny and showed some of the greatest character depth onstage.

The dynamic between Cameron Dinger (Pugsley) and Meagan Black (Wednesday) was perfect and I wish there were more scenes with just the two of them; but the chemistry between Black and Jacob Lewis, who played her love interest Lucas, was lacking.

Lewis had a brilliant improvised line that received thunderous laughter when Black accidentally calls him by his real name, yelling “It’s Lucas!”

However, most of the time Lewis was difficult to hear as his microphone seemed to be turned down.

Overall, it was a true ensemble cast — no actor outshining another. Though at times, even Lurch stole the show without saying a word.

Directors Bill Kirkley and Choreographer Rebecca McDonald made sure the entire stage was used effectively. Some of my favorite scenes, like Wednesday’s loving torture of Pugsley, were conducted on the sides of the stage.

There was not an opportunity missed, except maybe long drop for a mischievous boy from the second story of Addams mansion. The writers even made pointed social commentary in the liberal persuasion.

Of course, no Addams Family production is complete without a killer Dancing with the Stars-esque tango between a loving husband and wife.

Standing ovation after a killer dance and intoxicating musical numbers in second act left everyone snapping and humming out of theater.

The show has some language and sexual references and is inappropriate for children; but, it teaches the values of family and love. Cherish your families, folks.